Meet Frauke Petry, the Donald Trump of Germany
When Donald Trump became the 45th president of the United States, most Germans seemed to be in mourning. The country’s vice chancellor, Sigmar Gabriel, warned of “a rough ride” ahead; a week later, Chancellor Angela Merkel lectured the new president on the Geneva Conventions, telling him that the fight against terrorism does not justify banning refugees fleeing war and persecution.
But in the dawn of the Trump era, one political party formerly on the fringes of German society has been glowing: the anti-immigrant, anti-EU Alternative für Deutschland (AfD).
Four days after Trump’s inauguration, I met AfD’s party leader, Frauke Petry, who represents the district of Saxony, at her office in Leipzig, where she compared Trump’s victory to Britain’s vote to leave the EU. Both events, she said, inspire parties like hers, which are critical of the EU because they show that the increasing consolidation of power in Brussels is not inevitable. “It shows us at least that change is possible,” she said.
While other prominent right-wing leaders, like Marine Le Pen of France’s National Front and Geert Wilders of the Dutch Freedom Party, have received more attention for their fiery brand of politics, the AfD’s Petry may, in some ways, be the most consequential of all the
